Arts Council gives Sheffield gallery £750,000 for public exhibitions

Alex Moore

A Sheffield gallery has won a £750,000 grant for a project celebrating the city's creativity.

Arts Council England awarded the money from its Ambition for Excellence pot to Site Gallery, based in Brown Street, for its 'City of Ideas' proposal.

The aim is to create public art that will give life to existing spaces in the city centre. The gallery also hopes to create opportunities for young people, artists, the digital sector and public to work together over the next three years.

Artistic director Laura Sillars said: "City of Ideas embraces the power of art to connect people and to shine a light on this extraordinary creative and energetic city.

"We're working with an incredible team of passionate, brilliant people to make this urban realm project take shape who are all over the moon at today's news."

The project is being led by the gallery with support from Sheffield Council, British Council, Yorkshire Artspace, Showroom Workstation, Forced Entertainment, Artworks Sheffield, Eclipse Theatre, Sheffield Doc/Fest and Sheffield Hallam University.

Site Gallery, Sheffield. Will Roberts @vox_multimedia

The team will work closely with Sheffield Culture Consortium, with additional funding from Paul Hamlyn Foundation and Sheffield City Region local enterprise partnership.

Paul Houghton, head of Grant Thornton in Sheffield and board member of the city region local enterprise partnership, said: “This is truly excellent news for Sheffield.

"We’re a city which has a beating heart of creativity, coupled with some great examples of collaborative cross-sector activity.

"However, it is its ambition that has won us this Ambition for Excellence funding – which means it is so much more than being about the money.

"A vibrant Sheffield is a city sharing knowledge and connections – that’s what City Of Ideas is about, and this programme could be game-changing.”

Work on the City of Ideas project will begin in January, with the first year’s programme to be announced in the coming weeks.

Site Gallery is an Arts Council National Portfolio Organisation that gets revenue funding from Sheffield Council.

The council's cabinet member for culture, sport and leisure Mary Lea said: “This funding is great news for both the Site Gallery and the arts in Sheffield as a whole.

“We are a city with a thriving cultural scene and additional public arts and events, such as those that this investment will pay for, will enable us to build upon this reputation even further.”